Tuesday, June 3, 2014

Run, Bike, Swim not necessarily in this order

I love running but I more in love with exercising. Knowing that I have options is lovely, especially when my body needs a break from the pavement. Sunday, which is my rest day, I rode Zeke's bike and ended up here:

I love this view.

Saturday is long run day with the running buddies. I forgot to start my Garmin again so I missed up on half a mile or so but thank goodness everyone carries their own watches. I bet this weekend we'll kick it up and run extra long, which is lovely.

keep that Garmin going girl.

Summer running starts before the summer in these parts. I had a 'slow and sweaty' run the other day but the good thing was that I finally saw my friend Maria who always encourages me. She ran Boston and finished it at 3:50. She finished Houston at 3:37! She trains solo but always finds kind words to give us. Her pace during season is 8 minutes per mile, something I hope to do in the future. She told me she began much like me and assures me that if I train hard I can improve my time. I so love runners who help runners!

It's hot in here, can you tell?

My latest challenge has been to get back to swimming. I must have planned my big come back for months and it finally happened today. I kept thinking about how nice it would be to exchange one cross training day for swimming. It turns out I still have what it takes. I'm gonna stick with this plan for a while and see if it makes a difference in training. Swimming (and biking) help me with endurance and that's what I need to tackle 26.2 successfully.

Hello pool!

I believe that each day of training is considered epic. Running a marathon is easy considering what you go through to get to the start line. The medal is a sweet memory of that day but I believe that an athlete is made in the mundane act of pushing the body to perform. I thank God for the health and ability to exercise. It's a blessing I don't take for granted!

Question: How do you cross train? Do you see a difference in your main training?

This training cycle, I did swimming for my cross training. In fact, I took out some of the scheduled runs to do swimming instead for back reasons. I absolutely loved it. I would sit in the Jacuzzi for 20-30 min and then swim. I finally learned how many laps it took for 100m and I got up to 800m before I left for the marathon. I am about to go back to biking, too, but I love swimming.

And are you going to do a triathlon now? I'm doing my first one in October (Oktoberfest). Come join me.

Hey KW! Swimming rocks and you totally inspired me to go ahead and give it a try. I'm not sold on a tri just yet. I am giving all I have to marathons and I haven't even ran a half :/ so triathlons are not in the horizon but I am enjoying the benefits of training tough :)))

Cintia Listenbee is a Journalist, Speaker but more importantly, she is the wife of Pastor Zeke Listenbee and the mother of 3 amazing children. This SimplyCintia.com is the bilingual (English/Português) blog where she spreads hope one post at the time. Cintia enjoys running marathons and listening to audio books. She was born in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. To work with Cintia, go to CintiaListenbee.com